Thanks to @nilaypatel's interview with CEO Chris Best about Substack Notes (https://www.tiktok.com/@decoderpod/video/7221602731998498094), the company's questionable ethics are in the headlines again. Nilay points out that Substack needs to prioritize content moderation because Substack Notes are a consumer-facing social media offering. But I would argue that they were social media all along.

Not only that, but they were arguably an actual publication, with a staff of paid writers. I got a lot of pushback on this idea, for reasons I'm still perplexed by. We rail against the Twitter and FB algorithm for shaping content. But Substack was shaping content by paying actual people to write for them. They were creating a content ecosystem. And now, they are selling this ecosystem back to writers -- touting the way paid subscribers come largely from the Substack network.

In a recent newsletter, @parkermolloy points out that the vast majority of her paying subscribers come from recommendations through the Substack network. (https://www.readtpa.com/p/likes-are-now-florps). Chris Best said something similar in his interview with Nilay Patel, pointing out that the value of joining Substack is that it provides paying customers to authors. This means that the main "freedom" of Substack -- the freedom to leave -- is illusory.

If a writer leaves the ecosystem, they risk losing access to tons of paid subscribers who are being recommended to them through the network. So in my book, that makes Substack social media. It creates microcelebrities through its own network effects. And it promises potential writers a captive audience of readers within the network, who will become paying customers.

I don't begrudge any writer who wants to keep writing for Substack. Make money however you can do it! But I am tired of people saying that there is nothing scammy or problematic about a publication that hides its financials, hides who it is paying, and then says that we should just trust that it is a neutral platform with no agenda. And on top of that, they now refuse to have any kind of coherent moderation policy.

But here are the facts. Substack has promoted hate speech and misinformation by paying and/or not moderating its top authors and celebrities. It claims to offer authors freedom, while at the same time promoting the idea that leaving the network will prevent authors from gaining new paying subscribers. (And, as Parker Molloy showed, it's true that most new subscribers come from within the network, not from Twitter or elsewhere.)

Again, no shade on the many amazing authors who are on Substack (and whose newsletters I pay for). It's not easy to make a living writing, and Substack can be a source of valuable revenue. But let's not pretend it offers freedom, or that readers of one newsletter are somehow shielded from another newsletter's misinformation, racism, and transphobia. If you are an author, Substack is selling its network to you. If you are a consumer, you are being sold to authors. That means ...

... That means that at some point you will be exposed to hate speech, misinformation, and all the other problems that have plagued social media for twenty years. We are not in "new territory." Substack isn't a novel thing whose trajectory we can't predict. Go into this shit with your eyes open. And don't act surprised when it turns out that Substack is flushing you down the toilet and asking you to thank them.